


Together

by shadowsong26, TigerKat



Series: Serenissima [5]
Category: Battlestar Galactica (2003)
Genre: AU, Baroque Venice AU, Gen, Referenced prostitution, Total AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-07
Updated: 2015-09-07
Packaged: 2018-04-19 11:25:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 527
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4744538
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shadowsong26/pseuds/shadowsong26, https://archiveofourown.org/users/TigerKat/pseuds/TigerKat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kara Thrace and Karl Agathon join the navy.</p>
<p>[Arc 0]</p>
            </blockquote>





	Together

In retrospect, Karl really should have expected this.

After all, he'd known Kara for... how long now? Most of his life, certainly. So long he couldn't remember how they'd first met. They'd grown up together, chasing each other around the refuse-choked canals and rickety slums their parents called home. When her father left, he'd been the one to comfort her. When his father died, she'd been the one to comfort him. They'd stuck together so effectively that the whole neighborhood had assumed they'd get married.

Which... no. That was not going to happen. Ever. <p?He had to admit that Kara's reaction to the suggestion had been hilarious, though.

Her reaction when he'd told her that he was joining the navy had been less hilarious. He still had bruises.

So he really shouldn't have been surprised, when he lined up with the rest of the new recruits, to see a short young man with a ragged cap of blond hair step forward and answer to 'Carlo Bianchi."

He kept his tongue between his teeth then. He had no other choice-- he wasn't about to expose his pseudo-little sister to all the punishments of the Venetian navy. He waited, instead, until nightfall, then snuck into her bunk, covered her mouth with his hand and hissed,"What do you think you are _doing._ "

It was not a question.

Kara glared at him until he lifted his hand, then whispered, "Joining the navy. Obviously. What are _you_ doing?"

Karl ignored that foolishness. "I'm serious," he hissed back. "Leave. Now. Or they're going to catch you and then they're going to _kill_ you."

She rolled her eyes. "And if I leave now and they catch me they're going to hang me as a deserter. Come on, Karl! No one's going to miss me at home. You know that."

Her father was gone and her mother was drinking herself to death. Yes, he knew that. "But Kara..."

"Carlo," she interrupted. "Carlo, or you'll get me killed."

"Carlo," he repeated, and wondered with a brief sinking feeling if he'd just let her win. "You have to leave. You _have_ to."

She sighed sharply, then said, "It's this or a brothel, Karl. Either way, I could die. I'd rather take the path where my body belongs to me."

That shut him up.

"I'm sorry," he said, numbly, after a short silence. "I didn't realize..."

She shrugged one shoulder and refused to meet his eyes. "I didn't intend you should. I didn't intend that anyone should."

"Still," he said. "I'm sorry."

Kara, always uncomfortable with sympathy, shook her head. "Forget it. Look, this is what I want. Can't you just let me have it?"

He sighed, and leaned back against the wood of her bunk. "I don't want you here," he said, flatly. "If I had my way you'd be safe at home. But..." He held up a hand to forestall the protest he knew was coming. "But I know home's not safe. I... I think it never was. I won't tell."

She blew out a breath. "Thanks, Karl," she said, quietly, but sincerely.

"Don't thank me," he said, and went back to his bunk.


End file.
